Jonesy Jones wrote:After looking at those frames more closely in the video, I do see something a bit off, but nothing like what you are seeing on your end. That's weird right? Why are we seeing different things?

Because different browsers and different OS scales video with different methods. It was also described earlier here.

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When I watched the video in real time on the iPad, looked fine. When I magnify the stills shown here on the same iPad, the lines pop into view. A scaling issue when magnified? Perhaps, but may still point to an underlying issue.

Dmitry, once again though when viewed as a motion picture on the retina iPad Air (displaying pixels 1:1), there's no problem. Most video is shown on the web, and increasingly, that video is viewed on high resolution phones and tablets. So although the videos may exhibit serious artifacts and patterns at some resolutions of the viewing screens, for many, these things aren't even noticed as the average viewer looks at the content of the video.

Dmitry, as always, thanks for the response. I certainly see the problems you describe when looking at a single frame. I was trying to say, though, when you look at the video of moving pictures, as one would do normally, to my eye (admittedly not the best!), I'm not seeing a problem. So good to notice there are flaws, but it may not always mean the video is worthless. When these problems are easily evident in the motion picture, it's probably worthless.

The major feature that this adds for URSA Mini 4.6K is black calibration that we have already talked about on here.

This feature has been added to allow users to perform black shading calibration in the field. It should help for customers who have experienced raised blue channel in the shadows and crosshatching. It actually takes only a couple of seconds and can be carried out at any time. Full details for how to carry this out are in the manual which comes with the software download.

Tim Schumann wrote:Software 4.2 is now available from our support site.

The major feature that this adds for URSA Mini 4.6K is black calibration that we have already talked about on here.

This feature has been added to allow users to perform black shading calibration in the field. It should help for customers who have experienced raised blue channel in the shadows and crosshatching. It actually takes only a couple of seconds and can be carried out at any time. Full details for how to carry this out are in the manual which comes with the software download.

Tim Schumann wrote:Software 4.2 is now available from our support site.

The major feature that this adds for URSA Mini 4.6K is black calibration that we have already talked about on here.

This feature has been added to allow users to perform black shading calibration in the field. It should help for customers who have experienced raised blue channel in the shadows and crosshatching. It actually takes only a couple of seconds and can be carried out at any time. Full details for how to carry this out are in the manual which comes with the software download.

Will BMMCC ever got the update? Really can't understand why don't you provide any update for this camera.

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Thanks very much to the team, Tim. I certainly suffered from the blue channel issue and completely stopped using ISO 1600. Will be good if ISO 1600 again becomes a viable option. Best wishes of the season.

Dmitry Shijan wrote:In this video it is more like pixel level grid. Did you see it? Wonder if video upscaled on retina smoothes this effect.

Screen-Shot-2016-12-18-at-10.36.16-PM.jpg

Honestly even with your circles I still don't see anything. A page or two ago I think someone posted a video with supposed crosshatching and I couldn't see it there either. But then they posted the screenshot and it was clearly evident. But in this case I don't see it in the video or the screenshot, not even at all.

I am browsing on Safari on a Mac. Maybe that has something to do with it.

If you blow up the screen size on the still Dimtry posted, like 200"or 300-percent, you can see the lines. A bit of an overkill I think, as you can not see it at normal screen size/resolution, at least not on a IPad, or Jonesy's Mac.

Great news on getting he black balancing option, I heard this was coming... would be great to get,it on the other cameras, like,the Micro Cinema camera, and the big Ursa, when it gets FW 4.0, if the cameras can support this function.DS

I just did the black calibration: the scaling issue is still there in Media Player Classic, BUT, this is way better than before (even compared to post-RMA) !

Also when I zoom in, the really ugly fixed little squares that I had before, are invisible (well maybe still a little bit because the scaling grid is still there, but to my human's eye, it's not there).

So yeah, huge improvement ! Also I feel like FPN at iso 1600 in not-so-well lit situations is improved as well.

Only thing I noticed yet is a bug in the firmware, Custom Button 2 is fixed to the "change iris" setting, even if it's not the case in the menu.

Valentin, the observation about Button 2's behaviour is interesting. I shall shortly upgrade to 4.2 on the Mini 4.6K PL camera for which Change Iris is irrelevant due to the passive mount. I have the buttons set to False Colour and Focus Assist so I'll see if I still have that functionality. It will be later today as I have to change my mount to the B4 mount and put the Fujinon zoom on the camera while my APO lenses are stuck in an alternate universe between Victoria and Hong Kong (aka Canada Customs). The Fujinon won't allow me to check magenta behaviour, but I may be able to see if that blue channel issue is improved by the black shading option in 4.2.

I received an email from my support rep last week saying that my camera had failed numerous calibration attempts, and that they were sending a new camera out to replace it. So, I received the new(ish) camera yesterday (not sure if it was actually new... appears to have been handled previously, but that may have been to check it before it went out).

I just shot a quick minute in the office in less than optimal lighting conditions, and the crosshatch appears to be non-existent when taking a quick look at the file on my computer.

Also of note, this issue I was having with it losing iris control of my Sigma 18-35 when switching between playback and record modes seems to be fixed. However, it still displays the lens with an iris of 1.7 when wide open, even though it's actually 1.8.---c

Valentin, both of my monitor buttons function normally after upgrading to firmware 4.2. I altered Program 2 to toggle Colour Bars and then back to the way I want it and it seemed fine.

I also did the Black Shading calibration after the camera had been on for 10-15 minutes. I must say, with the body cap on the camera and false colour turned on, my display is a much smoother shade of false colour 'purple.' Going to put a lens on it today and take some underexposed shadow areas in raw and ProRes flavours just to see how the blue channel performs.

To have separate control over FPS, independent of resolution/project setting (1080pxx) you need to have "offspeed" or over/undercranking enabled, which the Micro camera will not currently do. Not sure the Micro camera's video processor have the ability to handle this extra processing.

I completely agree, I'd really like to see more function assignable to remote control like fps and also something like the UM46 to switch fast between 24p and offspeed rec (for example 60p)

Probably it was done in UM4.6k because it allow up to 160 fps and there is no common monitor that can handle this frequency. So the camera do a framerate conversation for monitoring purposes.

BMMCC is different, it just feels slightly crude and needs some cosmetic improvements in firmware like LUT support, assignable buttons (for fast switch focus peking or other overlay options), more overlays customization (for example i would like to see a classic center cross overlay only, custom color for focus peaking, custom overlay opacity), more than 360 shutter angle (is a very strange limitation as for me), and for sure i'll be happy to see manual black shading option because it may improve Cross Hatching effect which is clearly present in this camera. But unfortunately all this time BMMCC feels very abandoned and we see updates only for larger cameras and video recorders.

Dmitry, not sure how you expect the camera to support more than a 360 degree shutter angle. Do you mean in timelapse or regular motion video? In timelapse it could be used to create a longer exposure if that's desired or perhaps to show the effect of more motion across the frame whereas now the project frame rate is the determining factor in the duration of an exposure.

rick.lang wrote:Dmitry, not sure how you expect the camera to support more than a 360 degree shutter angle. Do you mean in timelapse or regular motion video? In timelapse it could be used to create a longer exposure if that's desired or perhaps to show the effect of more motion across the frame whereas now the project frame rate is the determining factor in the duration of an exposure.

i'm not a stop motion fan and maybe i missed something but in timelapse mode i can only control frames per second but can not set a long expose time (for example set it to 5 sec or more for light painting or other cool effects). it may sounds funny but time after time i use BMMCC as photo camera too and find that 360degree angle film-mimic limitation looks very artificial and strange for me.

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I do not know where to start on this one. But, the Micro Cinema camera is a purpose built Cinema type video camera for special applications. While it can be rigged up and used as a nice small general use video camera (which is how I use it), it is not a photo camera, not designed to be one, so the shutter is set for Cinema shooting, with 360-degree Max opening, tied to the camera frame rate to determine a actual shutter speed. Yes longer exposures with time lapse would be nice. As would I,proving the sensor calibration with regards to FPN, but agin this can be controlled with exposure for the most part.

As for monitor features, since the Micro camera has not built-in monitor, all the extra overlay features are not really needed, as most good monitors today, including the Video Assist, have all the monitor overlay features built in, and are quicker and easier to use, than going back into the camera menus. The monitors give different focus peaking choices, false color exposure tools, frame guides, which on my tests with the VA and the SmallHD 501, all align with each other.

As i previously stated, the Micro camera's advantage is its small size, which also limits some of its features and capabilities. It may receive some additional firmware updates, who knows (except for BM). Newer cameras seem to get the most attention, as did the Micro Cinema camera when it first was released, getting two additional FW updates to add missing features and imporve functionality. Now BM is concentrating on its flagship camera, solving all the issues it had with FW updates. BM did manage to update the VA to give LUT support and False Color exposure tools, which also benefited the Micro cameras.

A pleasant surprise: on the weekend I was working on a clip that was important but shot with insufficient light and seriously marred by cross-hatching to the point I thought it was useless while trying to salvage it in Resolve. But when I rendered it to h.264 HD in Deliver, it's completely fine. No hint of the visual artifacts we hate to see. Original footage is raw, and I always revert back to the original footage when rendering deliverables.

I just did the black calibration: the scaling issue is still there in Media Player Classic, BUT, this is way better than before (even compared to post-RMA) !

Also when I zoom in, the really ugly fixed little squares that I had before, are invisible (well maybe still a little bit because the scaling grid is still there, but to my human's eye, it's not there).

So yeah, huge improvement ! Also I feel like FPN at iso 1600 in not-so-well lit situations is improved as well.

Only thing I noticed yet is a bug in the firmware, Custom Button 2 is fixed to the "change iris" setting, even if it's not the case in the menu.

Yea I have the same results.....patterning is still there but looks much much better (as in much harder to see) with this new shading calibration. I still can't really push the camera to it's limits without revealing the crosshatching, but I don't really plan on pushing it to it's limits very often, and when I DO need to, I can always fix the crosshatch by adding a .5 to the x and y positions in premiere. So I think I'm pretty satisfied at this point.

You've got to be kidding. You guys know there's an image problem with the cross-hatching, even after this new firmware and performing a black shading calibration, and you're okay with it? You paid $5000-$5500 plus media and accessories for your 4.6K, that shouldn't have image issues like this, and you're just going to accept these issues? This is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever seen. These cameras should come with a warning or BMD should start advertising cross-hatching as a feature. No wonder BMD isn't fixing it...

Mike Halper wrote:You've got to be kidding. You guys know there's an image problem with the cross-hatching, even after this new firmware and performing a black shading calibration, and you're okay with it? You paid $5000-$5500 plus media and accessories for your 4.6K, that shouldn't have image issues like this, and you're just going to accept these issues? This is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever seen. These cameras should come with a warning or BMD should start advertising cross-hatching as a feature. No wonder BMD isn't fixing it...

If I read correctly, same thing happened to RED back in the days, see where they are now :pI had to edit footage coming from a FS700 a few days ago, noticed the same issue on a few shots as well.

For me, after the calibration, it's almost gone. It only appears in very (very) low light.

Mike Halper wrote:You've got to be kidding. You guys know there's an image problem with the cross-hatching, even after this new firmware and performing a black shading calibration, and you're okay with it? You paid $5000-$5500 plus media and accessories for your 4.6K, that shouldn't have image issues like this, and you're just going to accept these issues? This is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever seen. These cameras should come with a warning or BMD should start advertising cross-hatching as a feature. No wonder BMD isn't fixing it...

If I read correctly, same thing happened to RED back in the days, see where they are now :pI had to edit footage coming from a FS700 a few days ago, noticed the same issue on a few shots as well.

For me, after the calibration, it's almost gone. It only appears in very (very) low light.

The same thing did not happen to Red. Red did have initial issues, but they openly admitted the issues and fixed them. Even recent issues that Red has had they've admitted to them fairly quickly and fixed them. Two very different companies and you can't compare them in how they handle the faults with their cameras.

Mike Halper wrote:The same thing did not happen to Red. Red did have initial issues, but they openly admitted the issues and fixed them. Even recent issues that Red has had they've admitted to them fairly quickly

So they only had initial issues??? or they had recent issues ? Which one is it ? I'm confused by your contradictory statement.

I'm being facetious because they of course DO have issues with every camera. Most camera makers making cameras when first shipped have issues. I can name you bunch of BBQ stopping issues with the Alexa mini. But we find out about them, we decide if we can accept them, work around them, listen to what the manufacturer has to say about it or just move on to what does work for us.

Mike Halper wrote:The same thing did not happen to Red. Red did have initial issues, but they openly admitted the issues and fixed them. Even recent issues that Red has had they've admitted to them fairly quickly

So they only had initial issues??? or they had recent issues ? Which one is it ? I'm confused by your contradictory statement.

I'm being facetious because they of course DO have issues with every camera. Most camera makers making cameras when first shipped have issues. I can name you bunch of BBQ stopping issues with the Alexa mini. But we find out about them, we decide if we can accept them, work around them, listen to what the manufacturer has to say about it or just move on to what does work for us.

JB

Everyone knows Red had some serious initial issues. I said initial because they were new to the game like BMD relatively is, and they had more issues back then than they do now. The difference between them is that Red acknowledged the issues, discussed the issues openly with customers and users, and actively fixed the issues. They also told customers and users of their cameras back then that they were considering the cameras beta. Does Red still have some occasional issues with their cameras, especially when there's a new release? Sure, and that's what I was referring later in my statement, but again the way Red handles those issues is almost a complete 180 from the way BMD handles it.

Yes, every camera makers has issues, including Red, Arri, Sony, etc. However, the Ursa Mini has been out for about 9 months now, right? Assymetric magenta still not resolved 100% and BMD refuses to make further statements about it. Cross-hatching issue still exists and BMD refuses to make further statements about it. Red hasn't let issues go that long without fixing them or communicating clearly with customers and users what's going on with the issue.

The main problem, however, isn't that Red handles issues better/differently than BMD. They are different companies with different mentalities, and that's fine. Of course I wish BMD would be more like Red in this regard, but I'd rather they just fix the cameras. The real issue here is that there are image quality issues with the cameras and BMD waddles around admitting the issues and fixing them, and then the owners of these $5000-$5500 cameras (excluding what hey paid for media, BMD EVFs, BMD shoulder mounts, etc) are being complacent and saying things like "Yea I have the same results.....patterning is still there but looks much much better (as in much harder to see) with this new shading calibration. I still can't really push the camera to it's limits without revealing the crosshatching, but I don't really plan on pushing it to it's limits very often, and when I DO need to, I can always fix the crosshatch by adding a .5 to the x and y positions in premiere. So I think I'm pretty satisfied at this point." I just don't understand the complacency that exists in this community of BMD camera owners. You spent a lot of money on these cameras, so why be complacent with cameras that clearly have image quality issues. And that .5 xy trick won't work with ProRes, which A LOT of people are going to shoot with. This complacency is what's allowing BMD to think they can just do whatever they want and not release reliable cameras or develop 100% fixes for the issues.

Mike Halper wrote: The difference between them is that Red acknowledged the issues, discussed the issues openly with customers and users, and actively fixed the issues.

Hello Mike.

Your experience is very different to mine. That is certainly the perception of how RED work. I have a very different personal experience that I'm not allowed to discuss that flies directly in the face of that claim.

You know that it's not the full story....

You know they are notorious for removing posts from their own forum that are critical or antagonistic towards them right ?

You know there are very public spats between their CEO and high profile users like Bloom and Boyle right ?

You know they have as their motto...

"We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone with a bad attitude"...that was in the sig line of their CEO for a very long time.....not just at the beginning, but years later.

I'm not trying to say we should ever let Blackmagic or any manufacturer off the hook. But let's be realistic. They foster the idea of an open discussion but it's really not because many of those who would beg to differ don't post on their own forum or have been banned.

John, there's always going to be people in both camps with any company. I've had issues with Red and how they've handled things as well. I owned an Epic Dragon and now I don't so that should tell you something. However, overall, Red's handling of larger, highly discussed technical issues has been better than BMD.

But Red vs BMD is not the main issue here that I'm trying to point out. It's the complacency of BMD camera owners to accept cameras with imaging issues as good enough when those issues should not exist 9 months after the camera's release and large and long discussions of those issues (even while the camera was in beta), and BMD admitting the issues, but then not discussing them further while no fix exists. If BMD doesn't want to discuss the issue, that's fine if they fix it. But there is no fix that was alluded to would be coming. I don't see how someone could spend so much money on a camera system and be satisfied with that. And that complacency is allowing BMD to continue that way of not fixing the issues with the cameras.

I really want to like BMD. They're offering (on paper) a phenomenal camera at an amazing price. But they fall short in crucial areas. The assymetric magenta problem is much less important issue for me, but it's a serious issue for others. The cross-hatching is a serious issue, especially when shooting ProRes since you can't fix it with the .5 pixel xy move, and could ruin an entire shoot. The risk of that happening makes the camera an option that needs to not even considered.

I know you've personally had no issues with a few 4.6Ks, but others have had multiple cameras that have exhibited the same issues over and over and have shown evidence right here on BMD's own forum, so these are real legitimate issues and not limited to just a few people.

Mike Halper wrote:John, there's always going to be people in both camps with any company. I've had issues with Red and how they've handled things as well. I owned an Epic Dragon and now I don't so that should tell you something. However, overall, Red's handling of larger, highly discussed technical issues has been better than BMD.

But Red vs BMD is not the main issue here that I'm trying to point out. It's the complacency of BMD camera owners to accept cameras with imaging issues as good enough when those issues should not exist 9 months after the camera's release and large and long discussions of those issues (even while the camera was in beta), and BMD admitting the issues, but then not discussing them further while no fix exists. If BMD doesn't want to discuss the issue, that's fine if they fix it. But there is no fix that was alluded to would be coming. I don't see how someone could spend so much money on a camera system and be satisfied with that. And that complacency is allowing BMD to continue that way of not fixing the issues with the cameras.

I really want to like BMD. They're offering (on paper) a phenomenal camera at an amazing price. But they fall short in crucial areas. The assymetric magenta problem is much less important issue for me, but it's a serious issue for others. The cross-hatching is a serious issue, especially when shooting ProRes since you can't fix it with the .5 pixel xy move, and could ruin an entire shoot. The risk of that happening makes the camera an option that needs to not even considered.

I know you've personally had no issues with a few 4.6Ks, but others have had multiple cameras that have exhibited the same issues over and over and have shown evidence right here on BMD's own forum, so these are real legitimate issues and not limited to just a few people.

So here's a link to a video I just shot at UHD 1600 ISO, with detail sharpening turned to HIGH. I rendered it through premiere.

This is about as maxed out as the camera gets. You tell me if this shot is "unusable". To me, this shot still looks fantastic, The new calibration has clearly made this camera much improved. If I scale the player bigger and smaller, I can slighty see some of that crosshatch patterning barely peaking through, but I really have to look for it. To me, this camera is amazing. Just the fact that I can shoot 4.6k Prores is fantastic. Not even the $50,000 RED Weapon 6k will shoot 4.6k Prores. You keep comparing BMD to RED, but the cheapest RED (the Raven) is still several thousand dollars more expensive than Ursa Mini 4.6k. AND UM46 has a bigger sensor, better prores options, built in Audio, cheaper media, etc. Prior to this calibration update, I was feeling similar to you, in that the crosshatching was much more evident and effected the native prores files (though post render it was pretty much gone). But now with the new firmware, I struggle to see the crosshatching, and only really see it when I push the camera to it's limit, and even then it's hard to find...but any camera pushed to it's limit isn't going to look that great (RED included). Do I wish blackmagic was more transparent with their camera problems and fixes? Of course I do, we all do. But for us film makers who don't have a lot of money but still want a great image, Blackmagic, though incredibly frustrated at times (more like ALL the time), still makes cameras that produce amazing results, even if some workarounds have to be made.

Mike Halper wrote:John, there's always going to be people in both camps with any company. I've had issues with Red and how they've handled things as well. I owned an Epic Dragon and now I don't so that should tell you something. However, overall, Red's handling of larger, highly discussed technical issues has been better than BMD.

But Red vs BMD is not the main issue here that I'm trying to point out. It's the complacency of BMD camera owners to accept cameras with imaging issues as good enough when those issues should not exist 9 months after the camera's release and large and long discussions of those issues (even while the camera was in beta), and BMD admitting the issues, but then not discussing them further while no fix exists. If BMD doesn't want to discuss the issue, that's fine if they fix it. But there is no fix that was alluded to would be coming. I don't see how someone could spend so much money on a camera system and be satisfied with that. And that complacency is allowing BMD to continue that way of not fixing the issues with the cameras.

I really want to like BMD. They're offering (on paper) a phenomenal camera at an amazing price. But they fall short in crucial areas. The assymetric magenta problem is much less important issue for me, but it's a serious issue for others. The cross-hatching is a serious issue, especially when shooting ProRes since you can't fix it with the .5 pixel xy move, and could ruin an entire shoot. The risk of that happening makes the camera an option that needs to not even considered.

I know you've personally had no issues with a few 4.6Ks, but others have had multiple cameras that have exhibited the same issues over and over and have shown evidence right here on BMD's own forum, so these are real legitimate issues and not limited to just a few people.

So here's a link to a video I just shot at UHD 1600 ISO, with detail sharpening turned to HIGH. I rendered it through premiere.

This is about as maxed out as the camera gets. You tell me if this shot is "unusable". To me, this shot still looks fantastic, The new calibration has clearly made this camera much improved. If I scale the player bigger and smaller, I can slighty see some of that crosshatch patterning barely peaking through, but I really have to look for it. To me, this camera is amazing. Just the fact that I can shoot 4.6k Prores is fantastic. Not even the $50,000 RED Weapon 6k will shoot 4.6k Prores. You keep comparing BMD to RED, but the cheapest RED (the Raven) is still several thousand dollars more expensive than Ursa Mini 4.6k. AND UM46 has a bigger sensor, better prores options, built in Audio, cheaper media, etc. Prior to this calibration update, I was feeling similar to you, in that the crosshatching was much more evident and effected the native prores files (though post render it was pretty much gone). But now with the new firmware, I struggle to see the crosshatching, and only really see it when I push the camera to it's limit, and even then it's hard to find...but any camera pushed to it's limit isn't going to look that great (RED included). Do I wish blackmagic was more transparent with their camera problems and fixes? Of course I do, we all do. But for us film makers who don't have a lot of money but still want a great image, Blackmagic, though incredibly frustrated at times (more like ALL the time), still makes cameras that produce amazing results, even if some workarounds have to be made.

The things is, the cross-hatching shouldn't be there at all. It's an artifact being introduced by the camera, likely due to some kind bayer encoding issue. This cross hatching doesn't show up with other cameras shooting raw, ProRes, H264, etc, whether more expensive or less expensive. Sure, there's no doubt that the value of the UM4.6K is high, but even at this price range this crosshatch should not be there. Just because you didn't pay $50K, doesn't mean you need to compromise. This isn't about BMD vs Red anyway. Valentin brought up Red first in this discussion. Like I said, I'm talking about the complacency of accepting these issues with the camera. If you keep buying it as is, there's no reason for BMD to fix it or to care about issues in future cameras.

Mike Halper wrote:John, there's always going to be people in both camps with any company. I've had issues with Red and how they've handled things as well. I owned an Epic Dragon and now I don't so that should tell you something. However, overall, Red's handling of larger, highly discussed technical issues has been better than BMD.

But Red vs BMD is not the main issue here that I'm trying to point out. It's the complacency of BMD camera owners to accept cameras with imaging issues as good enough when those issues should not exist 9 months after the camera's release and large and long discussions of those issues (even while the camera was in beta), and BMD admitting the issues, but then not discussing them further while no fix exists. If BMD doesn't want to discuss the issue, that's fine if they fix it. But there is no fix that was alluded to would be coming. I don't see how someone could spend so much money on a camera system and be satisfied with that. And that complacency is allowing BMD to continue that way of not fixing the issues with the cameras.

I really want to like BMD. They're offering (on paper) a phenomenal camera at an amazing price. But they fall short in crucial areas. The assymetric magenta problem is much less important issue for me, but it's a serious issue for others. The cross-hatching is a serious issue, especially when shooting ProRes since you can't fix it with the .5 pixel xy move, and could ruin an entire shoot. The risk of that happening makes the camera an option that needs to not even considered.

I know you've personally had no issues with a few 4.6Ks, but others have had multiple cameras that have exhibited the same issues over and over and have shown evidence right here on BMD's own forum, so these are real legitimate issues and not limited to just a few people.

So here's a link to a video I just shot at UHD 1600 ISO, with detail sharpening turned to HIGH. I rendered it through premiere.

This is about as maxed out as the camera gets. You tell me if this shot is "unusable". To me, this shot still looks fantastic, The new calibration has clearly made this camera much improved. If I scale the player bigger and smaller, I can slighty see some of that crosshatch patterning barely peaking through, but I really have to look for it. To me, this camera is amazing. Just the fact that I can shoot 4.6k Prores is fantastic. Not even the $50,000 RED Weapon 6k will shoot 4.6k Prores. You keep comparing BMD to RED, but the cheapest RED (the Raven) is still several thousand dollars more expensive than Ursa Mini 4.6k. AND UM46 has a bigger sensor, better prores options, built in Audio, cheaper media, etc. Prior to this calibration update, I was feeling similar to you, in that the crosshatching was much more evident and effected the native prores files (though post render it was pretty much gone). But now with the new firmware, I struggle to see the crosshatching, and only really see it when I push the camera to it's limit, and even then it's hard to find...but any camera pushed to it's limit isn't going to look that great (RED included). Do I wish blackmagic was more transparent with their camera problems and fixes? Of course I do, we all do. But for us film makers who don't have a lot of money but still want a great image, Blackmagic, though incredibly frustrated at times (more like ALL the time), still makes cameras that produce amazing results, even if some workarounds have to be made.

The things is, the cross-hatching shouldn't be there at all. It's an artifact being introduced by the camera, likely due to some kind bayer encoding issue. This cross hatching doesn't show up with other cameras shooting raw, ProRes, H264, etc, whether more expensive or less expensive. Sure, there's no doubt that the value of the UM4.6K is high, but even at this price range this crosshatch should not be there. Just because you didn't pay $50K, doesn't mean you need to compromise. This isn't about BMD vs Red anyway. Valentin brought up Red first in this discussion. Like I said, I'm talking about the complacency of accepting these issues with the camera. If you keep buying it as is, there's no reason for BMD to fix it or to care about issues in future cameras.

Did you look at the clip I posted? Am I being complacent by saying that is a usable clip, knowing that the camera was on max ISO and Max Detail Sharpening when it was shot?

at a $5k price point you have to expect some kind of compromise. Black Magic wants to close that gap and create a camera that gives you all the features and quality of a pro camera for an eighth of the cost, and I think they are damn close. But it can't be easy to create something of such high quality for so cheap without any flaws.....they are continually pushing out updates to try and better the camera, and it is MUCH better than when it first launched....so I have high hopes for the future of this camera, and like John Brawley pointed out, there are several other professional cameras that suffer the same crosshatching problems, so it's not isolated to blackmagic.

You're assuming the issue is caused by high ISO shooting and detail sharpening settings. That's not necessarily the cause of the cross-hatching so that test doesn't really carry weight.

As far as the Sony sensor grid issue, the consensus seems to be related to light hitting the sensor at an angle because of light entering the lens at an angle. This is generally caused by lack of a matte box or not doing something to block light from hitting the lens. I haven't seen mention of that being the cause of the cross-hatching issue on the 4.6K. Those that have shot footage with the 4.6K that exhibits the cross-hatching, did you use a matte box and make certain that there was no light hitting the lens? If it, then that could be the cause of the 4.6K cross-hatching. Maybe that makes sense that John Bradley wouldn't have seen this in any of his footage from the multiple 4.6K's he's shot with since he would surely have used a matte box and make sure there was no light hitting the sensor.

As far as the value of BMD's cameras and what they're packing in for such a low price (relatively speaking), yes it's a great value. I said that already. But that doesn't excuse imaging issues that could crop up unknowingly for some unknown reason. Noise is understandable, so is moire, aliasing, etc, which you can expect with the lack of OLPF. If you could see the cross-hatching the monitor and adjust something until it's gone, that would be one thing. But to wrap a shoot, then finally get to look at the footage and find it has cross-hatching is a real problem.

Mike Halper wrote:You're assuming the issue is caused by high ISO shooting and detail sharpening settings. That's not necessarily the cause of the cross-hatching so that test doesn't really carry weight.

As far as the Sony sensor grid issue, the consensus seems to be related to light hitting the sensor at an angle because of light entering the lens at an angle. This is generally caused by lack of a matte box or not doing something to block light from hitting the lens. I haven't seen mention of that being the cause of the cross-hatching issue on the 4.6K. Those that have shot footage with the 4.6K that exhibits the cross-hatching, did you use a matte box and make certain that there was no light hitting the lens? If it, then that could be the cause of the 4.6K cross-hatching. Maybe that makes sense that John Bradley wouldn't have seen this in any of his footage from the multiple 4.6K's he's shot with since he would surely have used a matte box and make sure there was no light hitting the sensor.

As far as the value of BMD's cameras and what they're packing in for such a low price (relatively speaking), yes it's a great value. I said that already. But that doesn't excuse imaging issues that could crop up unknowingly for some unknown reason. Noise Would understandable, so is moire, aliasing, etc, which you can expect with the lack of OLPF. If you could see the cross-hatching the monitor and adjust something until it's gone, that would be one thing. But to wrap a shoot, then finally get to look at the footage and find it has cross-hatching is a real problem.

It's not caused by High ISO, but it is amplified by it. I've done many tests shooting from 200 to 1600, and the crosshatching progressively gets worse with each higher ISO setting. The same goes for Detail sharpening. With detail sharpening turned off, the crosshatch problem is less evident than when it is turned on. Since the calibration update, I can only start to notice the crosshatching when shooting at ISO 1600 with detail sharpening turned on (and even then it's very very faint). I don't plan on shooting at 1600 ISO very often at all with the camera, so for me, shoot at 400 to 800 I'm in the clear with crosshatching because I can't see it at all in those ISO settings.

Mike Halper wrote:You're assuming the issue is caused by high ISO shooting and detail sharpening settings. That's not necessarily the cause of the cross-hatching so that test doesn't really carry weight.

As far as the Sony sensor grid issue, the consensus seems to be related to light hitting the sensor at an angle because of light entering the lens at an angle. This is generally caused by lack of a matte box or not doing something to block light from hitting the lens. I haven't seen mention of that being the cause of the cross-hatching issue on the 4.6K. Those that have shot footage with the 4.6K that exhibits the cross-hatching, did you use a matte box and make certain that there was no light hitting the lens? If it, then that could be the cause of the 4.6K cross-hatching. Maybe that makes sense that John Bradley wouldn't have seen this in any of his footage from the multiple 4.6K's he's shot with since he would surely have used a matte box and make sure there was no light hitting the sensor.

As far as the value of BMD's cameras and what they're packing in for such a low price (relatively speaking), yes it's a great value. I said that already. But that doesn't excuse imaging issues that could crop up unknowingly for some unknown reason. Noise Would understandable, so is moire, aliasing, etc, which you can expect with the lack of OLPF. If you could see the cross-hatching the monitor and adjust something until it's gone, that would be one thing. But to wrap a shoot, then finally get to look at the footage and find it has cross-hatching is a real problem.

It's not caused by High ISO, but it is amplified by it. I've done many tests shooting from 200 to 1600, and the crosshatching progressively gets worse with each higher ISO setting. The same goes for Detail sharpening. With detail sharpening turned off, the crosshatch problem is less evident than when it is turned on. Since the calibration update, I can only start to notice the crosshatching when shooting at ISO 1600 with detail sharpening turned on (and even then it's very very faint). I don't plan on shooting at 1600 ISO very often at all with the camera, so for me, shoot at 400 to 800 I'm in the clear with crosshatching because I can't see it at all in those ISO settings.

When you shoot and see the cross-hatching are you using a matte box and making sure there's is no light hitting the lens? Perhaps, like the Sony sensor grid issue, this cross-hatching is simply a matter of light hitting the lens, and then the sensor at an odd angle. The best way to test this would be to shoot something without a matte box and/or make sure light is hitting the lens, check the footage for cross-hatching (without moving the camera or changing the lighting). If it has cross-hatching (even a little bit) then put the matte box on and/or block the light from hitting the lens and shoot again, then check the footage for cross-hatching.

Not all the shots that have cross-hatching are underexposed or have the cross-hatching only in shadows, so I don't think that assessment is accurate. It was also shown earlier in this thread that adjusting the debayer settings gets rid of the cross-hatching, so it's gotta be something else. Being that it could be eliminated with some debayer adjustments it should be fixable in software. BMD just needs to deliver that fix.

Mike Halper wrote:Not all the shots that have cross-hatching are underexposed or have the cross-hatching only in shadows, so I don't think that assessment is accurate. It was also shown earlier in this thread that adjusting the debayer settings gets rid of the cross-hatching, so it's gotta be something else. Being that it could be eliminated with some debayer adjustments it should be fixable in software. BMD just needs to deliver that fix.

It's caused by a mismatch in uniformity of pixels, usually the green channel. As previously discussed at length in this thread. Some stills processing applications have a specific correction for this.

Well which is it? In your last 2 posts you've said it's caused by 2 different things.

"it's to do with where the blacks are sitting, hence seeing it in darker and near blacks. Same issue ones (near) over exposure and ones (near) underexposure" and then "it's caused by a mismatch in uniformity of pixels, usually the green channel".

It can't be both, and since "some stills processing applications have a specific correction for this" and the cross-hatching appears in properly exposed footage and in areas of a shot that are not shadows or too dark, it's obviously the latter and not the former. So there should be no reason why BMD doesn't fix this in firmware and at least in DaVinci Resolve.

This is the point that I'm talking about. It clearly is something that can be fixed, but BMD is not fixing it, and owners/users of the camera are being complacent with accepting the camera as is, even though it could be better with a firmware/software fix. Either that, or what is the reason why some 4.6K's (such as the ones you've used) don't exhibit the issue, but other 4.6K's (multiple times multiple 4.6K's used by the same users) do have the cross-hatching issue? It's either a software issue (likely since it's been shown to be fixed with software or it is a shooting issue (less likely since properly exposed footage exhibits the issue and you've ruled out the matte box or light hitting the lens).

I'm looking forward to testing the new FW Black Shading, and that sounds very promising.

I'd still love for BM to include control over the parameters that are being adjusted in the rawtherapee app, in camera would be even better. Then we could reliably deliver clean ProRes files without needing further processing, and without revealing any crosshatching issues that might make our clients mad at us